It looks like your browser does not have JavaScript enabled. Please turn on JavaScript and try again.

Situation Awareness and Collaboration Tool

Regional Operations

Share This Page

​​The California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES)—​in association with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE) and through a strategic partnership with the Department of Homeland Security’s Science & Technology Directorate (DHS S&T)—acquired the Next-Generation Incident Command System (NICS) software for use by California’s emergency services professionals. The California deployment of the NICS software is called Situation Awareness and Collaboration Tool (SCOUT). SCOUT provides an information sharing environment to facilitate operational and tactical collaboration among California emergency responders and interagency situational awareness for local, tribal, state, and federal partners for small to extreme scale homeland security incidents, such natural disasters, technological hazards, intentional attacks, and human-caused emergencies.

SCOUT is being rolled out in three phases through 2018. Phase 1 launched in April 2016 and includes agencies already participating in the NICS pilot. Phase 2 is estimated to begin in early 2017 and will be a controlled expansion to additional interested and eligible agencies. Phase 3 is scheduled for mid/late 2018 and will open to all interested and eligible agencies. Movement into each phase will be assessed on system and operational stability and performance.

Updated program and registration information will be posted here throughout each phase.

The SCOUT Charter establishes the Situation Awareness and Collaboration Tool (SCOUT) Partnership for the State of California and provides the governance structure for managing the statewide usage of the SCOUT platform.

DHS Science & Technology First Responders Group announces the transition of NICS to an operational capability for emergency responders in California, Victoria Australia, and the Federal Geospatial Information Infrastructure (Fall 2016).